Denial – “The show’s fine, it won’t be cancelled”; “They’d never cancel a show with a squinty jillion average viewers that wins its timeslot”; “They’d never cancel a show from JJ Abrams”; “The network executives love this show”

Anger – “Why this show? It’s not fair, when reality crap continues to get renewed!”; “How can this happen to my show? “; “The morons who run the network are to blame!”

Bargaining – “If they cancel this show, I’ll never watch anything on this network again!”; “If we send them bags of crap/sign internet petitions/barrage them with emails/perform other goofy stunts it will save the show!” “Netflix will save it!”

Depression – “I’m so sad, why should I ever start watching a new TV show again?”; “If every show I ever like gets cancelled… What’s the point?”; “Maybe I should just stick to DVDs of old shows”

Acceptance – “It’s going to be okay, it’s had a good run of seasons”; “At least we got the story wrapped up, unlike lots of other shows”.

–

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The broadcast television renewal and cancellation season has already begun. Between now and mid-May you’ll know the fate of all your favorite broadcast primetime shows, whether they will return next season or be consigned to the dustbin of TV history.

To help you this season, I’ve assembled a few of our most popular items for your handy reference:

The annual E! Online “Save One Show” nonsense/fan false hope poll began while the bear was away. It certainly brings traffic to their website, and the cancellation bear can’t blame them for that one bit, but it also brings plenty of false hope to desperate fans by implying that the results of the poll matter in any way.

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The broadcast television renewal and cancellation season is upon us. Between now and mid-May you’ll know the fate of all your favorite broadcast primetime shows, whether they will return next season or be consigned to the dustbin of TV history.

To help you this season, I’ve assembled a few of our most popular items for your handy reference:

Dick Clark, well-known TV host, producer of American Bandstand, and New Year’s Eve celebration fixture died today of a “massive heart attack” according to his agent. He was 82.

He is survived by his third wife, Keri Wigton, and three children.

ROBERT A. IGER, CHAIRMAN AND CEO, THE WALT DISNEY COMPANY,

ON DICK CLARK’S PASSING

For more than half a century, Dick Clark brought the best of American music to audiences across the country, creating careers and countless fans for artists on his iconic shows, “American Bandstand” and “New Year’s Rockin’ Eve.” We’re proud that ABC was home to those programs and will always be part of his legacy. On behalf of everyone at Disney and ABC, we send our sincere condolences to Dick’s family, as well as the three generations of fans who will miss him as much as we do.

Nielsen Media announced today that it would be abandoning its trademark people meters as data gathering devices for its television ratings measurements and would begin using Facebook Likes and Twitter Trends instead.

Reached at its NY headquarters, a Nielsen spokesman explained the decision:

We get a lot of criticism about being outdated and behind the times, but what could be more up to the minute than Facebook and Twitter?

We’ll use our proprietary techniques honed over decades of convincing people that our people meter numbers were accurate to now convince them that the numbers derived from Facebook and Twitter mean something.

And we’re not done yet. Our research labs are already at work on incorporating online poll results and P2P download counts in future ratings measurements.

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The broadcast television renewal and cancellation season is upon us. Between now and mid-May you’ll know the fate of all your favorite broadcast primetime shows, whether they will return next season or be consigned to the dustbin of TV history.

To help you this season, I’ve assembled a few of our most popular items for your handy reference:

If the past is any indication, there will be plenty of opportunities for playing along reading our comments in the coming weeks.

Yes, I know they’re not all excuses, but the “Fan Excuse/Threat/Lament Bingo Card” would get a bit cumbersome, and you know you’ll be happy when you get to fill in the “I will boycott the network if they cancel it” square nearly immediately each day.

Commenter tip: Simply using the phrase Fan Excuse Bingo in our comments will autolink back to this post. Couldn’t be easier!

Denial – “The show’s fine, it won’t be cancelled”; “They’d never cancel a show with a squinty jillion average viewers that wins its timeslot”; “They’d never cancel a show from JJ Abrams”; “The network executives love this show”

Anger – “Why this show? It’s not fair, when reality crap continues to get renewed!”; “How can this happen to my show? “; “The morons who run the network are to blame!”

Bargaining – “If they cancel this show, I’ll never watch anything on this network again!”; “If we send them bags of crap/sign internet petitions/barrage them with emails/perform other goofy stunts it will save the show!” “Netflix will save it!”

Depression – “I’m so sad, why should I ever start watching a new TV show again?”; “If every show I ever like gets cancelled… What’s the point?”; “Maybe I should just stick to DVDs of old shows”

Acceptance – “It’s going to be okay, it’s had a good run of seasons”; “At least we got the story wrapped up, unlike lots of other shows”.

Fans of Seinfeld know that today (December 23) is Festivus, the holiday for the rest of us.

It’s a day to share Festivus miracles, air your grievances from the past year, and engage in feats of strength.

Since it’s likely to be a very slow TV news day (now that we have The X Factorfinale ratings), I thought folks might like to do one (two, or all three!) of those in the comments for this post.

Our Festivus miracle is the fact that TV by the Numbers reached 14.3 million unique visitors in the past year, and had 77 million pageviews. Or would that be our feat of strength? It’s certainly not a grievance.

As a huge Arrested Development fan, I am super excited, but as a realist, I don’t know whether to get my hopes up. I mean, I’m still doubtful we will ever see the movie, but another season of the show almost seems possible. Maybe. According to TMZ, they do not have a deal in place for who would air the show (IFC, I’m looking at you), which adds further doubt to the equation.

So do you think there is any chance we will see anymore Arrested Development?

A lot does happen in 34 years. I had a big head of hair in 1977, Nielsen didn’t have people meters yet, nobody had invented the DVR yet and “Internet” wasn’t even a household word, let alone a household tool. Despite this, the Nielsen pamphlet from 1977 explaining the ratings that USA’s Ted Linhart (@TedOnTV) posted reads a lot like the back and forth in our comments section in 2011.

It’s obvious from the tone of the pamphlet, that Nielsen was as misunderstood by fans of TV in 1977 as it remains to this day. And fans weren’t any happier about it in 1977. Nielsen responds to some of the many complaints it must’ve been peppered with even then, like:

“Yes, but just because a program gets the most votes doesn’t mean it’s the best”

Nielsen’s response:

Of course not. Neither is the best candidate for office always elected. Neither does a jury always reach the right decision. Obviously, quality and popularity don’t necessarily go hand in hand.

[…]

Quality is an elusive thing. One man’s treasure is another man’s trash and so it always will be. Since there are just so many hours in a day for TV broadcasting, no one has yet come up with a proposal that makes as much sense as counting the votes.

And as ever, no matter how much explaining one attempts, people still are misinformed about Nielsen. The first comment on Ted’s post complains that Nielsen doesn’t measure DVR or online viewing. But as Ted himself constantly notes, Nielsen has been measuring DVR viewing for 5 years and also now measures online viewing provided the online version has the same commercials that aired on TV*.